BKE v Office of Children’s Guardian & Anor [2015] NSWSC 523

Supreme Court New South Wales

Medium Neutral Citation: BKE v Office of Children's Guardian & Anor [2015] NSWSC 523 Hearing dates: 17 April 2015 Date of orders: 11 May 2015 Decision date: 11 May 2015 Jurisdiction: Common Law Before: Beech-Jones J Decision: (1) Pursuant to s 7 of the Court Suppression and Non-publication Orders Act 2010, the name and address of the plaintiff and any child referred to in the evidence before the Supreme Court or the Civil and Administrative Tribunal and the name and address of any other person whose publication would identify their names and addresses not be published without the leave of the Court.

(2) The plaintiff be referred to as "BKE".

(3) The order made by the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal on 31 October 2014 refusing the plaintiff's application for an enabling order under the Child Protection (Working with Children) Act 2012 be set aside.

(4) The NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal rehear the plaintiff's application according to law.

(5) There be no order as to costs. Catchwords: ADMINISTRATIVE APPEAL – adult persons residing with authorised carer must hold a working with children check clearance – plaintiff's wife is carer for grandson – plaintiff disqualified from obtaining clearance from the Office of the Guardian due to convictions in 1968 and 1970 – applied to NCAT for enabling order and clearance – assessment of risk – application refused based on finding that event subject of charge laid in 2000 for which he was acquitted happened.

JUDICIAL REVIEW – appeal on a question of law – procedural fairness – finding that applicant committed offence for which he was acquitted – clear notice required – statutory requirement to consider information provided by applicant in relation to application for review – failure to consider applicant's explanation of incident – review of fact finding by NCAT – standard to be applied – whether findings illogical or had no evidentiary support .